I have long been interested in epistemology, even before I knew the word for it.
At first I wondered how people with access to the same information that I had and with similar educational and cultural backgrounds could come to opinions and beliefs that were wildly different from mine.
In my self-centered youth I assumed it was just to piss me off. But when I carefully explained to folks how stupid their opinions were, with well researched data and irrefutable arguments, I got less than optimal results.
In one case someone at work grabbed me from behind and threw me on the ground from the worktable I was sitting on, eating lunch. As the sole hippy working in an early-70s welding shop full of rednecks my audience wasn’t ready for my well-thought-out and irrefutable arguments in favor of legalizing weed.
Sometimes life lessons hurt. Like how to read a room.
At some point I came across the term “epistemology”. It’s a large and complex field but I just think of it as the study of how we know what we know.
Over 50 years after finding myself in free-fall while eating a ham sandwich I am still baffled at many peoples’ thought processes.
For instance, the gentleman I recently met while canvassing for a Democratic candidate for the US house in my district.
His thesis was that all members of the Democratic party are liars, and he aggressively asked how I could associate with an organization who’d sole purpose was to destroy the USA.
I reject that thesis.
I had neither the time or inclination to engage with him, so I literally ran away from him. He followed me out of his house to the sidewalk and continued to yell questions and insults down the sidewalk as I walked away.
Not a good candidate for a session of street epistemology.
I hear right-wing politicians saying that anyone who isn’t a member of the MAGA movement hates the USA and is trying to destroy it. Which is strange, because I consider myself to be a patriot doing what I can to “form a more perfect union”.
Folks on the left are also fond of saying that those on the right, especially those in the MAGA movement, are bent on destroying the American way of life.
I suspect that most of the folks on the right also see themselves as patriots trying to make this a better country. Many of their concepts of “better” don’t align with mine.
We need to find a way to live together.
So.
How do you know what you know? Does your knowledge come from a friend, a TV pundit, a teacher, a clergy member or some other authority figure?
Or is it something you’ve figured out on your own?
Or is it something that’s self-evident? If so, is it self-evident to others?
Can you separate things you know for sure from things you believe to be true?
On a scale of 1 to 10, how sure are you of your beliefs?
For any specific belief, what kept you from rating it higher or lower? Is there some information you need to either raise or lower the rating?
In non-judgmental curiosity would you be willing to share your beliefs with someone who disagrees with you, and listen to their beliefs?
Maybe you know something they don’t. Maybe they know something you don’t.
I don’t know about you, but if I’m wrong about something I want to fix that as soon as possible.
There’s a guy with a political podcast who says he’s pretty sure he’s wrong about at least half of what he thinks he knows, he’s just not sure which things.
I disagree with about half of what he says on his podcast, and I’d love to have a one-on-one conversation with him. Maybe we’ll both learn something. We have mutual friends, maybe we’ll meet someday.
It’s worth a shot.
I have neither the space or the knowledge to dig deep into epistemology. There are huge articles about it on the web that I have, at best, skimmed.
But I still find it fascinating.
How about you? I will open up comments to everyone on this post:
What did the waitress ask Jean-Paul Sartre when he asked for a cup of coffee with no cream? "We are out of cream. Would you like it with no milk?"
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.
— attributed to Mark Twain, but it could have been Josh Billings, Artemus Ward, Kin Hubbard, Will Rogers, Edwin Howard Armstrong, or Anonymous.
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